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From the English journal Feb.1918  ° 


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BETTER HIGH-SCHOOL PLAYS 


GLADYS C. TIBBETTS 
High School, Port Clinton, Ohio 


Many valuable articles have been contributed to educational 
literature on the production of the amateur play. Their sugges- 
tions are original and stimulating, but in many cases they minimize 
the most important thing of all—the choosing of the school plays. 
_ The kind of play we ask our boys and girls to work on is vastly 
more important than the way that play is produced. As a matter 
of fact, the mechanics of stage production are quite simple. A 
few weeks’ study of the rules of stage deportment, exits, turns, 
and crosses, a sense of order, and, most important of all, a fair 
- amount of ingenuity will be ample equipment for the amateur 
“coach. What she needs most is a warning not to waste her energy, 
to present only what is worth the presenting, and not to lower the 
standard of her work by presenting a cheap play. 

The farce-comedies which seem to be most popular for high- 
school production are weak, silly, and utterly trivial. They do 
not begin to be worth the time and effort put into them. Think 
of high-school seniors working for weeks on slapstick stuff that 
it would be a waste of time to read. Think of them memorizing 
line after line of The Irishman’s Dilemma, Box and Cox, Mishaps of 
Mabel, A Howling Scream, and so on indefinitely. They memorize 
slipshod, ungrammatical sentences when they might be learning 
lines of beauty and rhythm. There is a directness and vigor in 
the literary style of a good play that is unequaled in any other 
branch of literature. It is a fine thing for boys and girls to learn 
the lines of such a play, but an utter waste of time to learn an 
inferior play. If we see Johnny reading a dime novel in school, we 
_ make him throw it into the wastebasket; but when Johnny gets 

to be a Senior, we make him work for three weeks on his part in 
An Arizona Rose. 


98 


THE IMPROVEMENT OF AMERICAN SPEECH 97 


scientific thought. But the youth and the abuses of phonetics are 
no reasons why phonetic methods should not be used when they are 
practically effective. It does not follow because one studies speech 
phonetically that one must be a rabid advocate of spelling reform, 
of an international language, of colloquial speech as contrasted with 
formal speech, or of any theory for the alteration of speech. The 
phonetic method merely supplies the facts upon which a theory may 
be based, if one is moved to the building of theories. 

As to theories for improving speech, what was said at the begin- 
ning of this paper may be repeated here at the conclusion, that there 
is little one need or can do. Everyone knows how hard it is to get 
any half-dozen persons to agree upon a theory. It is hard enough © 
to get them to agree upon a fact, though there is at least some hope 
of doing this if the fact can be brought clearly enough into view. 
What we need in our attempts to improve American speech Is a 
greater knowledge of the facts. We are not yet ready for formal 
creeds and programs. If we know the facts, the theories and volun- 
tary decisions will take care of themselves. Publicity and informa- | 
tion are the great safeguards of health in language just as they are of 
sound morality in business and public affairs. The professional 
improver of speech who tries to palm off a fancy manufactured 
article upon the public as the real thing does not deserve well of his 
country. ‘The most he can do is to build up a speech-proud class 
who bear their speech about with them as the symbol of their 
superior excellence. They will always be found out, however, by 
the person who knows how to analyze speech, who is not put upon 
by a false glamor. It is the business of those interested in instruc- 
tion In speech, which we take to mean the improvement of it, to 
provide the honest seeker with the means of deciding questions for 
himself by showing him how speech is made. If he is honest he 
will not go wrong; or if he does he will soon set himself right. 
Sidney advised the poet who would write to look into his heart and 
write. The best advice that can be given to the man who would 
speak is to look into his mouth and speak. If anything is added 
to this to make it a complete golden rule, let it be that after you 
have looked into your own, look also into your neighbor’s mouth 
and see how he speaks. 


BETTER HIGH-SCHOOL PLAYS | 99 


Why? Because we do not stop to consider whether the play is 
harmful or beneficial. We think of it solely as an entertainment. 
Usually the chief object in presenting a play is to make money. 
The class treasurer suddenly discovers a deficit. It must be met, 
so the class votes to put ona play. Or it may be the athletic asso- 
ciation, or the literary society. Every high school mothers some 
waif of an organization that is always clamoring for money to keep 
it alive. Or they may start on a campaign to raise money for the 
class gift. Wherever fifty or a hundred dollars is urgently needed, 
a class play is a welcome panacea. 

We see the high-school play 1s not put on for art’s sake, but for 
money’s sake. The teacher looks for something which will answer 
the purpose with the least possible effort and expense. She pores 
over catalogues of dramatic publishing houses, and finally selects 
a farce-comedy which is warranted to bea sure success for amateurs. 
She hears they put it on in a nearby town and it made a big hit, 
so she plunges into it with conviction. What creatures of imitation 
we all are at heart! You know the rest—the ups and downs of 
rehearsals, the wholesome fun of working together, the night, and 
the big success. Everyone is delighted, the young actors are 
flattered beyond measure, and the newspapers speak extravagantly 
of the work of pupils, teacher, and school. The school is a few 
dollars richer, but the boys and girls are considerably poorer for 
time and energy spent on trash. They have learned silly lines 
they will not forget for months and perhaps years. This sort of 
thing may entertain for the moment, but it has no lasting good. 

The significant thing is that the students have not the discern- 
ment to realize the triviality of what they are working on. They 
mistake horseplay for humor, and the smart talk of low comedy 
for clever repartee. Is it any wonder that when they leave high 
school they will be bored at Mantell’s Richelieu, and say, “Come on, 
let’s go see a musical comedy’”’ ? 

We should stop putting on plays solely for dollars and cents. 
If money must be raised, we can find plenty of other means that 
will not produce harmful results. When the high school can afford 
to present a play, let it be a good one—something they can study, 

and interpret, and mold into a production worth while. 


I0O THE ENGLISH JOURNAL 


The value of the good play in the high school cannot be over- 
emphasized. In the first place, it stimulates the appreciation of 
good literature as nothing else can do. ‘The spoken word thrills 
and inspires when the written word is passed over superficially. 
In acting, every line is significant, and the exact meaning of every 
word must be brought out. The sentence is a vital thing, and the 
actors must not only be sure that they understand and appreciate 
it, but they must try to make their audience understand and appre- 
ciate it also. Only occasionally will high-school boys have dramatic 
art to accomplish so much, but almost all will gain the appreciation 
themselves. 

He cannot fail to note the clarity and directness of style in 
plays. The dramatist never leaves a muddled sentence. He has 
no time to waste in confusing his audience. They have to get the 
point, and get it by hearing it just once, for they cannot order it 
repeated, nor can they complacently turn back a leaf and read the 
sentence over. ‘Then, too, he has a chance to study first hand the 
subtle, charming, and elusive thing we call humor. The dramatic — 
teacher will bring out all kinds in the play; as the French analyze 
it, the humor of situation, of character, and of repartee. In the 
play, humor is produced as scientifically as sodium chloride is in 
the laboratory. 

Further, he will study characterization. He will observe how 
a trait of character is suggested by words and action. Study of 
plays is quite superior to that of novels in this respect. When he 
reads a book he sees characters in his mind, but when he acts the 
character he zs the character. He voices the character’s thoughts 
and interprets his moods. Any boy who has acted the part of 
Petruchio will know how it feels to swagger around and knock over 
tables. He will know the character more thoroughly than if he 
spent a month studying it from the written page. And this analysis 
of people, this acquaintance with human nature, is the greatest 
study in the world. If we could teach that, many of our educa- 
tional problems would be solved. 

All this is lost with the cheap play. It would be senseless to 
take it seriously, because it is cheap. The amateurs simply learn 
lines. They cannot study it because there is nothing to study. 


BETTER HIGH-SCHOOL PLAYS IOI 


Secondly, the good play brings out personality. In assuming 
a role, the boy or girl forgets himself for the time and has to put 
on the temperament of a different character. He lets himself be 
broadened and strengthened for the part he is taking. In this 
way his sympathies are deepened and he gains a sensitiveness and 
response to things that will make his personality strong. He loses 
timidity, the sign of self-consciousness. In this respect, dramatic 
work does a vast amount of good to the class we teachers know well 
as the quiet, bright type—students who are naturally brilliant in 
intellect but reticent in manner. Such persons need to study self- 
expression. The type is much more common among girls than 
boys, and it is truly a problem to know how to bring it out. 
Athletics and the social life in the high school do a great deal for 
such girls, but we have found that parts in plays did more for our 
quiet girls than any other thing we have tried. 

A distinction should be noted here between the kind of work we 
give to boys and that we give to girls. Boys like plenty of action 
and characters they can draw in broad lines. Girls do better on 
quiet, more subtle scenes, and they like to work out little details 
in character. Another thing we have found by experimenting is 
that pupils get most good out of the play by taking parts which 
are not directly suited to them. For instance, instead of giving 
our quiet little girl the part of a demure maid, we assigned her the 
role of an active, garrulous old spinster. After practice she did 
surprisingly well and it gave her a great amount of confidence in 
herself. The maid fell to the lot of an overexuberant girl, and it 
was a surprise to see how attractive she was in a subdued state. 
It is a great temptation to give them parts that we know they can 
do well instead of parts that will do them most good. Avoid it. 

In urging the presentation of better plays, I have followed 
objections with interest. Invariably they hinge on the difficulty 
of the work (a bugbear to the inexperienced teacher) or the expense. 
So many teachers are afraid to put on a good play because it seems 
too pretentious a task. This is a delusion. From experience it is 
safe to say that standard comedies can be given more satisfactorily 
than plays of a lower class because there is more to them in plot 
and character to hold the interest of the audience. Crudities that 


THE ENGLISH JOURNAL 


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106 _ THE ENGLISH JOURNAL 


mark amateur work can be more easily overlooked in them than 
‘in a low farce. One year in our high school we experimented on a 
great variety of plays, ranging from Shakespeare to low comedy. 
Without exception the play which gained best response was an 
adaptation of the Taming of the Shrew, and the other plays were 
successful according to their actual value. 

The presenting of the better play can run as smoothly and simply 
as any other. As a rule, the simpler the stage settings are, the 
more effective they are. We obtained most artistic results by 
using settings formed by dark green burlap screens hinged together. 
For interior settings we decorated the screens conventionally to 
suggest the paneled walls of a room, and pinned-on paper pictures 
and hangings. We adapted plain mission furniture for interior 
scenes and rustic seats for exterior. Almost any kind of a setting 
can be built up in this way. If it is too difficult to present, suggest 
it. Thus a flower garden can be suggested (as in the Japanese 
theaters) by a conventional design of paper blossoms pinned on the 
screens. In stage art symbolic settings have long been recognized 
as the most effective thing, and they are much more satisfactory 
for amateur work than worn-out, tawdry, painted scenery. 

The dramatic advantage of simplicity is this: while it may not 
directly attract, it does not detract, as painted scenery is likely to 
do. The attention is focused on the characters on the stage, and 
the setting becomes what it should be—merely a framework. 

This other objection is the one which causes much practical 
difficulty. The school taboos any unnecessary expense. ‘There 
are a number of highly desirable plays which demand neither royalty 
nor costuming, but it must be admitted that these are few. Ti 
the play is recent, it is more than likely that a royalty of from ten | 
to fifty dollars is demanded; and if the play is classic, it is more 
than likely that it requires special costuming. But if the play is 
not put on to raise money, surely the performances would net 
enough to cover expenses. If this is found impossible, restrict your 
choice to the simpler classic plays. | 

The best catalogue any teacher can have is her own memory, 
her knowledge of plays she has seen and studied, and her ability 
to adapt these. The Drama League has published a selective list 


get) 


®. 


BETTER HIGH-SCHOOL PLAYS 107 


of plays for amateurs which is by far better than anything collected 
heretofore, but even this list contains many plays far from credit- 
able, and the teacher must use careful discrimination. There are 
many catalogues issued by publishing houses, but we must remember 
these are prepared for a wide amateur circle,.and they leave the 
wheat with the tares. It is for the high school to use only the best. 
There are plenty of good plays. We are the heirs of six centuries 
of English dramatists. Only they will not come tabulated to us. 
We must use observation and initiative in seeking them out. 

A few weeks ago I received a letter asking for some suggestions 
fora play. It read: ‘‘Tell me a good play to put on—something 
real funny. This.town doesn’t like any highbrow stuff.” That 
letter was amusing. It presupposes that nothing classic is funny, 
which is an error, and, further, that the average audience does not 
like good things, which is a worse error. They may not have had 
the advantage of seeing standard plays, but that is no reason that 
they would not like them if they were creditably presented at a 
reasonable price. As a matter of fact, the audience is very loath 
to go back to the lower standard when once they have been given 
something worth while. Years ago Walter Pater was deeply 
incensed at this belittling of popular appreciation, and he wrote 
to his fellow-writers, ‘‘Do not presume upon the willing intelligence 
of. the reader.”’ His advice was wise. We might say, ‘Do not 
presume upon the willing intelligence of your audience.” They 
_ will understand and appreciate more than you give them credit for. 
Too often we mistake their applause for approval. I have seen an 
audience applaud honestly at a cheap performance because it 
amused them for the moment and complain the next day, when 
they thought it over seriously, because the schools were not working 
on something worth while. 

They really want the best. So let us give it to them, as far as 
wecan. After all, art was born for the great public and not solely 
for the cultured few. 


THE ADMINISTRATION OF ENGLISH IN THE HIGH- 
+ SCHOOL CURRICULUM 


CECILE B. McCROSKY 
High School, Marion, Ohio 


INTRODUCTION 


The questionnaire published below was addressed to the heads 
of the English departments of one hundred of the first-grade high 
schools of the state of Ohio. : 

The questions are concerned with the administration of English 
in the high-school curriculum. 


1. Number of questionnaires sent out............... 100 
2. Number of questions on each list................ 50 
3. Number of replies received and tabulated......... 33 
4. The majority of the replies came from city high schools 


QUESTIONNAIRE 
INTRODUCTORY QUESTIONS 


(1) Name of school? (2) No. of pupils? (3) No. of 
teachers ? (4) No. of teachers devoting full time to English ? (s) Half- 
time ? (6) Three-fourths of time? (7) Salary of English teachers ? 


QUESTIONS ON EQUIPMENT 


Do you have: (x) A room used exclusively for English ? (2) Reading 
tables in or adjoining the English room ? (3) Bookcases ? (4) Filing- 
cabinets for filing themes? (5) Wall maps and charts? (6) Bulletin 
board ? (7) Mimeograph ? (8) Stereopticon, curtain, and slides? 
(9) Pictures used with work taught at various times? (10) Victrola and 
educational records ? 


LIBRARY EQUIPMENT 


(1) Is there a special room for the library ? (2) Is library open during 
the day for reading and reference ? (3) In the evening ? (4) No. volumes 
in the library ? (5) No. added last year ? (6) Amount of money expended 
annually on books? (7) What proportion for English department? - 

Underscore each of the following which you have in your library: (1) Dic- _ 
tionary (unabridged). (2) Encyclopedia. (3) Handbook of mythology and 


108 


